NTEMPORARY 


THE METROPOLITAN MUSEUM OF ART 


5 


SWEDISH CONTEMPORARY 
DECORATIVE ARTS 


An Address given at the luncheon of the Advisory Committee 
on American Industrial Art, February 2, 1927 


BY 


GREGOR Pautsson, Pu. D. 


President of the Swedish Association of Arts and Crafts, 
Commissioner-General of the Exhibition of Swedish 
Contemporary Decorative Arts 


I AM very glad to have the opportunity to speak to a 
gathering of American experts in modern industrial 
arts, several of whom represent firms whose names are 
well known all over the world. Mr. Kent has asked me 
to tell you about the experiences which I have had in the 
work done in my country during recent years in order to 
bring the arts and crafts to a higher level. Now I must 
confess that I find it very difficult to point out the prin- 
cipal features in the development of our arts and crafts; 
we are in the midst of our work and therefore I cannot 
see it in the right perspective. Out of the occurrences of 
these years I can only grasp some facts which seem to me 
to be of special importance. 

First, I shall take the liberty of indicating some facts 
which are vot the causes of our success. I do this because 
of some misunderstandings apparent in an otherwise 
very excellent newspaper article written by a distin- 
guished critic. He says, “Sweden has an advantage over 


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SWEDISH CONTEMPORARY 


America in the lower wages that prevail there.” This is 
not true. Sweden pays, as far as I know, the highest 
wages in Europe. There are workmen in the factories of 
industrial art to whom higher wages are paid than to the 
bricklayers, and the Swedish bricklayers have as high 
wages as their American brothers, if you make allowance 
for the purchasing value of our money. Sweden is no 
enemy of the American idea of high wages, at least in all 
trades where we have not the competition of other coun- 
tries in the export market, and such competition does 
not exist in the industrial arts. 

The second misunderstanding is that the products of 
certain Swedish associations, especially those figuring as 
exhibitors of textiles, are assumed to have had a govern- 
ment subvention or to have been aided by private funds. 
This also is not true. The Swedish textile crafts are 
thoroughly self-supporting as far as concerns their pro- 
duction. They receive support from the government or 
from private individuals only for their educational 
work; this has no relation to their manufacturing for the 
market. Now it is, of course, true that the wages paid in 
this branch are quite low, because, to a great extent, the 
products are made by peasants as by-work. But these 
low wages are not a sweating system; the peasants’ cost 
of living is low, and through this by-work small farming 
becomes more profitable. Indeed this by-work is an im- 

ortant economic factor, and one of the keys to the 
problem of farm-relief. 

In analyzing the Swedish industrial arts, I think it 
will make things clearer to divide the production into 
two parts, the textile arts, which are handicrafts, and 
the other industrial arts, which are to a great extent 
organized on a quantity production basis. 


[2] 


DECORATIVE ARTS 


The Swedish textile arts are a revival of handicrafts 
along the lines pointed out by Ruskin, in fact, the only 
example of an industry the revival of which has suc- 
ceeded along these lines. Its success has depended on the 
continuance of original Swedish traditions, artistic and 
social. The interest in past times is great’ among all 
classes. The Swede certainly wants all modern comfort 
in his home, but when it comes to furnishing he pre- 
serves the spirit of past days. Each province has its own 
customs and traditions; modern life cannot destroy 
them. The critical period, that of the temptations of 
young industrialism, has passed. 

I believe, therefore, that the problem of the revival of 
the textile arts and crafts is a purely national one, and I 
shall pass to that of the other industrial arts, which has 
an international range. Now it is my opinion that you 
cannot get an industrial art of high quality unless you 
have the right social and economic conditions. 

The industrial arts cannot succeed solely by depen- 
dence either upon a very rich class or upon classes of low 
culture. Rich people frequently fail to distinguish be- 
tween the precious and the beautiful, unless they belong 
to the limited group of amateurs, whose main interest, 
again, is not modern objects but antiquities. The classes 
who have no culture, on the other hand, who try to 
follow the rich by buying imitations, or who use their 
first spare money for pleasure, are not our customers. 
We founded our efforts upon the interest of the middle 
class and the cultivated labor class, whose desire it 1s to 
get beautiful surroundings before they buy a motor-car. 
Sweden is happy in having such a middle class—a very 
large class indeed. Without them, we could not have 
produced the objects exhibited in the Metropolitan 


Le Skt 


SWEDISH CONTEMPORARY 


Museum." These people in Sweden say: “You shall eat 
below your earnings, dress according to them, and 
establish your home above them.” 

I think that this constitution of the middle class is not 
peculiar to Sweden; the same class lives under the same 
conditions in most countries. We have only to arouse 
their interest. We did that in Sweden through the press 
and through exhibitions, which we arranged along the 
lines of an educational program. The first of these ex- 
hibitions was arranged in 1917. My society exhibited 
furniture and other household things, designed by 
artists chosen by us and manufactured by a small 
group. This furniture was designed for the small homes, 
for workmen’s homes, etc. Now, the workmen became 
suspicious and sniffed charity in our work, which of 
course we did not mean at all. But the middle class be- 
came interested and supported us. So we continued to 
hold other exhibitions consisting of furniture for them. 
And then we got a slogan, which unfortunately cannot 
be literally translated without losing most of its force, 
but which means something like: “Better things for 
everyday life.” This slogan has been a very important 
instrument in our movement to place the industrial arts 
on a broad basis. It originated as the title of a pamphlet, 
which I wrote and which was distributed at the Swedish 
Fair in Gothenburg in 1919. The slogan was a good 
headline for the newspapers, firms adopted it, it was on 
everybody’s lips. People became conscious that they 
must make their homes more dignified. The homes 
which were set up by the young people were to a quite 
astonishing degree built with that slogan in mind. 

Of course, there must be something behind a slogan. 

1 January 17—March 20, 1927. 


[4] 


DECORATIVE ARTS 


The manufacturers must produce those better things, 
and the dealers must sell them. Now a pretense exists 
among most manufacturers and dealers that the con- 
sumers’ taste cannot be improved. But this is not true. 
People buy what you tell them to buy. The dealer told 
them to buy his common stock; we told them not to buy 
it. And the dealer had to get other stock. This is very 
simple; in fact, it is too simple. Dealers still carry the old 
stock, but you can buy the new glass and pottery in 
most stores in Sweden. And, the policy of the best manu- 
facturers being directed towards better design and qual- 
ity in all their new products, the time will undoubtedly 
come when the majority of Swedish products will be on 
the same level as that which appears in the exhibition in 
the Metropolitan Museum of Art. 

So much for the relation between producer and con- 
sumer. I repeat that the establishing of this relation is 
an educational work. It is of course easier to carry it out 
in a small country like mine, but there is no essential 
difference between a great country and a small one in 
this respect. You must, however, have people who de- 
vote themselves exclusively to it. It is not a side-line. 

Now I come to the codperation between producer and 
artist. In order to get the manufacturers to understand 
the importance of artistic quality in their products, 
we had to consider the economic basis of production; we 
had to consider the relation of the quality of the product 
to its selling capacity. We insisted that the competition 
by means of low price and low quality should be re- 
garded as an infantile stage of industrialism, and I think 
this is true. If you look at the motor-car business, for 
instance, you will find that there is more interest today 
in good cars than in the inexpensive but short-lived 


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SWEDISH CONTEMPORARY 


ones. Sweden cannot compete with other European 
countries in low prices, but we can compete in quality, 
and in the establishing of quality the artist plays an 
important part. So our industrial art is founded upon a 
solid economic basis. But however correct this principle 
may be, the establishing of codperation between manu- 
facturers and artists is a very difficult thing, and we had 
hard days before we obtained sufficient experience. It is 
not enough to bring artist and manufacturer together; 
both parties must accommodate themselves to new con- 
ditions. The manufacturer must depart from his usual 
routine work; he must give the artist a place in the 
schedule of his production. It is not enough to buy pat- 
terns; they are of no use by themselves, rather they do 
harm. The artist must be in the factory, and not as a 
workingman but as a staff-oficer. He must have re- 
sponsibility, and he must have freedom. He cannot 
make designs three hundred and sixty-five days a year, 
he must have leisure time to get inspiration for his 
work. Therefore, most of our factories require the 
artists to work only half the time. 

In the second place, the manufacturer must have 
patience. The first year’s work is never good; the designs 
on paper may be so, but not the products. It 1s only when 
the artist has become accustomed to the technique, the 
materials, and other conditions that the products are 
good. 

In the third place, you must get the right artist. Here 
I shall try to indicate the most important points of our 
policy. As a rule we do not use the students of the arts 
and crafts schools as leading artists in factories. We 
have found that in only a few cases have they sufficient 
capacity. The place of the great mass of the students in 


[6 ] 


DECORATIVE ARTS 


arts and crafts schools is as assistant-designers to the 
artists, as factory foremen, or as skilled artisans for 
special work. The creation of new models is so important 
that only the very best men should be permitted to 
make them. So instead of using the average designer to 
do this work, we try for the best artists that we can get: 
painters, sculptors, and architects. Now it is, of course, 
not an easy task to find an artist of high genius who 1s 
willing to change his work. Most artists are people who 
have studios and starve. But they have freedom and 
they believe they are geniuses. To go into manufacturing 
is a humiliation. Therefore, you must get the few intelli- 
gent artists who are still young, who have a progressive 
spirit, and whose minds are not sophisticated. I always 
feel that the greatest responsibility of my society 1s to 
get the right artists in touch with the manufacturers. 
When a manufacturer comes to us asking for an artist, 
we always take plenty of time, examine his factory, its 
organization, aims, and staff. We analyze the conditions 
of production in that factory, we make a program, not 
only for a season but for a series of years. 

Then we proceed in the same way with the artist and, 
after all these preliminaries, the two men are brought 
together. It may seem to you that this is a very elabo- 
rate process. But, as I said, I look upon the artist as a 
sort of executive officer, and, therefore, you must find 
two men who can codperate and you must find the basis 
for that codperation. One mistake spoils two successes. 

Manufacturing in recent years was a matter of rou- 
tine. To be frank, it required but little knowledge on the 
part of either manufacturer or artist. The new industrial 
art will rest on a more dignified basis. It will be founded 
upon the requirements of a cultivated consumer. It will, 


fgirs 


SWEDISH CONTEMPORARY 


therefore, require a cultivated producer and an intelli- 
gent artist, and it will strive to put the life of the com- 
munity on a higher level than that which characterizes 
the primitive age of a young productive system. 


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NOGRAPHS | 


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NDUSTRIES: A. 


THE OILLISS PRESS 


